Archive

Quotes

The first requirement of a statesman is that he be dull.

—Dean Acheson, 1970

To be turned from one’s course by men’s opinions, by blame, and by misrepresentation shows a man unfit to hold office.

—Quintus Fabius Maximus, c. 203 BC

People revere the Constitution yet know so little about it—and that goes for some of my fellow senators.

—Robert Byrd, 2005

Politics is the art of the possible.

—Otto von Bismarck, 1867

Politics is the art of preventing people from taking part in affairs which properly concern them.

—Paul Valéry, 1943

He may be a patriot for Austria, but the question is whether he is a patriot for me.

—Emperor Francis Joseph, c. 1850

If you must take care that your opinions do not differ in the least from those of the person with whom you are talking, you might just as well be alone.

—Yoshida Kenko, c. 1330

I am no courtesan, nor moderator, nor tribune, nor defender of the people: I am myself the people.

—Maximilien Robespierre, 1792

The most hateful torment for men is to have knowledge of everything but power over nothing.

—Herodotus, c. 425 BC

Sic semper tyrannis! The South is avenged.

—John Wilkes Booth, 1865

The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed (and hence clamorous to be led to safety) by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.

—H.L. Mencken, 1921

Every communist must grasp the truth: “Political power grows out of the barrel of a gun.”

—Mao Zedong, 1938

The U.S. presidency is a Tudor monarchy plus telephones.

—Anthony Burgess, 1972